Fate Unworthy
by americancheeze
Summary: Extremist factions seek to force contracts and wield impossible powers for destructive ends. All those who work for progress will soon find their lives in danger and their hope might lie in the very weapons meant to be aimed at them. In the process, the traitor knight finds herself wielded for justice by the hands of a cold-blooded killer.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter One: Dapper Danny Draws

It wasn't easy finding a day that wasn't drenched in rain in this time of year and in this part of the world. Why in God's name Gregori Mont, head of one of many growing traditionalist factions within the Mages' Association, had decided to host a gathering of mages in Wexford, Ireland of all places was beyond most of those that had answered the invitation. As typical of mages, each of the twenty also wondered why nineteen nobodies had been called together on that rainy night to the city's relatively small opera house. Many of them recognized peers among their count, all twenty considered by outsiders (and the other nineteen of them) to be soundly competent mages of little renown. Each the best of a few generations old magus family barely old enough to be seeking prestige be associated with their lineage. Each an heir to a lineage that wanted nothing more than for that to have any significance in the magical community.

Questions were answered and created when they were allowed into the unseen sections of the building, to a larger and more utilitarian venue beneath the theater where seating surrounded the stage. Similar to a Roman forum, the place was equally used for practice by performers as it was for discourse and the settling of disputes by mages in the general area. On this night, smack dab in the center of the stage was a relic anyone could surmise was of great value just from the security (both physical and magical) on its glass case. Nearby was a summoning circle that quite a few recognized on sight.

A summoning circle of the variety documented as used in the Holy Grail Wars in Fuyuki repeatedly, most recently the Fifth Holy Grail War years prior. It took only moments for the information to spread by chatter and an assumption to be made. They were here for the selection of at least one master for some sort of Holy Grail War. That the movement of their faction was growing in intensity. That one of them would have a chance at making their family mean something. So when they were seated, the gathered heirs sat with great anticipation. When Mont stepped onto the stage to speak, they waited quietly but impatiently.

"Hello and welcome to my little gathering here. I assume that my little display here has inspired quite the fantastic theory? Good. Your assumption is likely correct. This is a recreation of the site of a summoning ritual for entry into a Holy Grail War, and tonight which of you will represent us in the one to come with be decided."

There was a clamor, and Theodore Glant, recently ascended to head and not mere heir to his house, stood and did not wait for license to speak, "What Holy Grail War is this? The three families are all opposed to a repeat of the war and have made it clear they mean to stop any attempt at another."

"Patience, Mr. Glant. I was going to get to that once the drama of the announcement had properly stewed." Mont smiled and clapped his hands together, "The solution is simple. The hosts of the coming war have secured another Grail for us to fight for."

There was another clamor.

"Another Holy Grail? Are you mad?"

"As real as the Fuyuki Greater Grail I assure you. I have seen it myself."

Andel Marlow, an alchemist of high reputation interjected. "How has the Mages' Association not gotten any word of this? Such a discovery could change the very foundations of the magical world!"

"We have taken great pains to keep this a secret, Mr. Marlow. Pains we will continue to undertake. Until the end of this Holy Grail War this must remain secret at any cost."

Every magus in the room was immediately aware that the bounded field around the building had shifted. They had been notified by some feature of the incantation. It not only warded people away, it would hold them within with equal potency.

Glant shouted immediately over the resulting chaos, "What is the meaning of this treachery?"

Their host held his hand together, his expression regretful, "We cannot afford to lose control of this Grail. Yo are the finest of our faction and if we are to proceed, we must assure a champion for our cause, and that there are none among you that can betray us."

"None of us volunteered to fight a war for you!"

"You speak of change and will not fight for it, Mr. Glant? Causes require courage... a willingness to sacrifice."

Marlow tried to storm the stage but was stopped by two members of the ample security force. He still yelled at the man regardless, "What sacrifice? What is this?"

Mont shook his head, sincerely saddened by the truth of the matter, "Well, research on the Grail has led to the belief that prior attempts at replicating the ritual have been imperfect due to the lack of the Three Great Houses' involvement in the copy. The ritual has safeguards that require someone fill the roles of those families. The only way to establish our own Great Houses is to determine the strongest families among us under the supervision of the Grail. This is the purpose of tonight."

"You mean to have us fight to the death?"

"So you are saying you will not fight for your family's legacy? For the right not only to seek access to an omnipotent wish granter, but to ensure your lineage is establish in your generation as a Great House? There are forty of us here. One of us will be a voice to shape the very future of magic going forward. That voice will not be that of a coward!"

Everyone in the room stopped protesting, the sheer magnitude of that promise dragging their ambition to levels surpassing their fear and sense of self-preservation. Some would argue their common sense.

Mont smiled, "So, I would like to see a show of hands. If this arrangement is to your liking, please raise your hand."

Seventeen hands raised immediately, three more raised right after at the sight of the majority.

"Very well. Then let-"

The sealed door came open at great speed, going further than the hinges were designed to, breaking them as the door slammed the wall behind them. Through that door stepped a lone man that had neither triggered nor disabled the bounded field to enter. He was six feet in height with the build of a soldier clad in gray formal wear. Custom dress shoes with functional soles rather than the poor traction of their ilk, a full three piece bespoke suit with a flat cap. In one of his gloved hands was an ornate blackthorn walking stick. No... that was clearly a shillelagh. He was clearly no older than twenty-five though his handsome face was unnaturally cold and expressionless as he advanced through the doorway without pause at a deliberate walking pace towards the summoning circle. The man's eyes barely registering seeing anything as he scanned the room and assessed the occupants.

"Who are you?" Mont demanded, "You were not invited to this meeting!"

The well-dressed man simply kept walking forward.

"Restrain him!

Three members of the security force advanced, reinforcing their bodies with magic, when they got just outside their reach and readied to attack, the man sharply darted forward and, with his shillelagh still held in one hand like a walking stick he brought the head of the weapon across and into the temple of one of them. The guard slammed into the ground as if hit full swing by a bat. A two handed thrust with the tip of the stick into the ribs of the second guard broke several off them and took him to the ground gripping at his gut. The third guard managed a hook punch to the jaw of the man as he himself got clubbed in the chest. The intruder's head snapped to the side and immediately righted itself. The guard flew back at least three feet and thrashed around grabbing at his collapsed chest as he slowly died from one hefty swing. The intruder's expression still hadn't changed. In fact he had only slowed his advance for a moment rather than stopping.

One of the remaining guards on the stage took a step back, a panicked expression on his face, "Shit... that mystic code... that cold look. It's Dapper Danny."

Mont looked at the man, "Who in god's name is 'Dapper Danny'?"

Marlow stepped in the way of the man, "Hold it right there. You aren't just strolling in here and stealing away our shot at this!"

'Dapper Danny' stopped, placed the walking stick in front of him, both his hands resting on it, "This was to be a contest to decide the strongest was it not?"

Mont stepped between the man and the relic, "How did you find out about it?"

"The land speaks to those who listen. If I'm putting it in a less enigmatic way, your obsolete means of magical communication have downsides against those with the proper magical knowledge."

"You tapped our communications?"

Danny did not smirk, nor was their any pride or smugness in his voice, "For my people, you may as well have been talking loudly in a hallway and now complaining I was passing through."

"Who are you to presume you should represent us in the Grail War?"

"I never said I would represent you."

"Bastard!" Marlow lunged, belting the taller intruder straight in the face with a haymaker empowered by mana.

The sound of the impact was comparable to a gunshot. An solid crack was heard by all as Danny's head moved slightly to the side before he resumed looking straight ahead without so much as a flinch or acknowledgment of the attack. Marlow however clasped his broken hand in pain and screamed.

There was a muttering of "That wasn't body reinforcement. There's no signs of it. He just took that naturally."

"There was nothing natural about that."

Dapper Dan coldly reached out and with one hand grabbed Marlow by his face, employing mana for the first time he lifted the man with that one hand and began to squeeze. Marlow screamed as he tried to reinforce his skull and strike at the limb, but it was being in the grip of a pneumatic press and trying to survive by striking it with your bare hand.

"Yield." the intruder coldly demanded.

Marlow managed to call out a simple finn shot, hitting his attacker point blank in the chest. The only reaction from Danny was striking upwards into Marlow's sternum with the head of his shillelagh, the enchantment enhancing its impact enough to blow Marlow flying twenty feet into the corner of the stage, breaking his back. Well... most of the man went. His head was still in Danny's hand for another moment before the man tossed it at the scared guard's feet. Blood flowed from it, mixing with the growing pool of urine at the guard's feet.

The room was silent, stunned.

Danny repeated, this time to the room, "Yield."

Six of the remaining seven guards rushed him, the seventh running the other direction to try and force his way out the other, still sealed door. The other six halted when he pulled out a small pouch that he knocked into the air with the head of his walking stick, the impact not magically enhanced but instead the recoil this time. He let the momentum twirl the stick around his finger and as the bag descended he knocked it once again into the air by timing it to hit the stick on the outside side from the direction he was spinning. Just that was astounding dexterity, and the trick whipped the speed of the spin higher.

Mont yelled at the guards, "Don't be scared of juggling! Restrain him!"

They started forward as the bag came down again, this time he struck it with gusto and with the actual spin behind it. On impact the pouch exploded, spraying small coins at the guards at the velocity far higher than that of shotgun pellets. None died, their bodies had been strengthened with magic after all, but all six went down, most unconscious but all badly injured.

Seeing this, ten of the master candidates rushed him in attempt to stop any further trickery. Danny darted forward, swatting one of the coins that had landed close with the magic of the cudgel. The act propelled the coin into the leg of one enemy, tripping him and getting him trampled by three others. The first to actually reach Danny was dazed by a cane strike to the temple, the rebound empowered instead to double the force of a spin strike to another man. The impact of two activations was enough to kill the target instantly and propel him back with enough momentum for his skull connecting with that of the man behind him knocked that man unconscious. The next was answered with the curve of the stick hooking behind his forward foot, the magic in the weapon turning what would have been a leg sweep into the victim landing head first instead of back on the ground and his skull getting cracked open on the floor. Two strikes to the face of Danny were met with no change in expression, only smashing. Another melee attacker fell victim to Danny hitting an incoming finn shot with his cane, using the magic to spin it again into an uppercut that sprayed the contents of the victim's head all over the ceiling.

Dispatching a yet another target with two rebound building strikes he kept that spin and dispatched the last of the ten with small tripping action and stomping the side of the attacker's leg to break it. The spin he used as a shield to ward off five incoming finn shots, though doing so killed the momentum. The ones that had charged but not been out down had recovered at this point and tried again, getting themselves unceremoniously smashed by the shillelagh.

Nineteen magi down in a matter of minutes. The ten surviving candidates that had not charged moved to form a wall between him and the relic and intended to cast more single action spells. Coldly, the intruder smacked the head of the cane against his palm to spin it around his finger with the magic, and gave a mighty strike to the skull of the magus at his feet, shotgunning blood and brain matter all over the line of defense, unsettling them, stunning them. Leaving them open.

Dapper Danny was on them in that instant in one magically enhanced dash, smashing away at as many skulls as he could as fast as he could. Four were dead in little more than a blink. Mont finally decided to act, an incantation calling a bolt of lightning that arched towards Danny and into the back of a candidate yanked into it's path. Another of the survivors tried to swing a fist but Danny remorselessly slammed his fingers into the eyes of the man, grabbing his head like a bowling ball and augmenting his strength with mana. Danny then proceeded to bludgeon his other attackers with the man, duel wielding a man and his shillelagh with cartoonishly deadly effect. A spinned strike to the now corpse sent it flying at Mont as he tried to finish the incantation of another spell, not killing him, but momentarily taking him out of the fight.

The frightened guard, Joey Cornwall, gave up clawing at the sealed door and collapsed against it in fear, watching the intruder beat the dazed and panicked surviving candidates with a face that had not changed expression even to flinch since he had entered the room. The guard's mind reeled Not again surely... it couldn't happen to him again. The memories he'd tried to forget of his college years experimenting with old blood magics with the other edgy magi in his school. They played at calling themselves a cult of dark magi, and then fallen in with a crowd of drug, sex, and hedonism. Not to mention the real dark magics of some sick bitch playing at being Morgan le Fay. She hadn't been of course. That much was made clear that night years ago when Dapper Danny came strolling into a blood ritual. One that Joey had decided was too far when 'Morgan' showed they were going to sacrifice some little kid from some magus family hers didn't like. At the sound of thwacking and the squishing of human bodies giving under the impact of that damned cudgel flooded his ears and his sight, Joey relived the deaths of that entire cult he'd once been a part of.

His voice trembled as he teetered on the edge of madness, "Oh, Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are caaallling..."

Joey had researched the man after he was allowed to walk away that night. 'Dapper Danny', 'the Golem', an inhuman monster the Association labeled as a freelance mercenary. Not that he was ever paid anything according to the rumors. The records he'd found said he was a magus named Daniel Coroin, head of a small clan that practiced old druid magic passed down from the age before invaders thought they killed all the druids off. Joey knew the truth though. That was not a human. Dapper Danny was a-

"MONSTER!" Mont shouted as he freed himself from the weight of the corpse.

Danny looked at the man, making no move, "You called all these families here to kill each other. No... more accurately you called them together so you could kill them. A massive sacrifice to fuel a ritual beyond any magus without the use of a Grail."

"We have a Grail!"

"No you don't."

Mont began t chant, but Danny raised a hand, moving his lips wordlessly in a silent utterance that ended as he breathed in and out on the last inaudible syllables. Gregori Mont felt his body tighten, an unnatural feeling disrupting his ability to focus. It was certainly a curse, at least as powerful as one uttered with a two line incantation, but the stone-faced man hadn't uttered any actual words or taken enough time to cast that strength of spell.

Mont could barely speak, "What is this? It... it crept into me through my casting."

The wheels began to turn in the man's head, "You used the leyline, casting a curse using the mana I drew in? What in the world...?"

"You do not have a Grail. You are trying to force the ritual through drivel like this because you are so greedy for power and the atrophy of the magic."

"I'm protecting our traditions from those fools at the Association! Melloi is destroying everything we've tried to build. If he wants to take apart the Grail, then we have to wrench its power from him no matter that cost before he throws it away! WE WILL ACCESS THE ROOT!"

Danny strode forward, unmoved, his face still as stone. Mont tried to back away, but the curse kept his body tensed and unsettled. He cried out in pain as Danny struck his leg with a baseball swing of his shillelagh. The hit was not enhanced with magic, it was just a normal, knee-shattering blow.

"You are a pollutant. You will not taint heroes of old with your blood feud." his words should have been ones of passion, but his words were as cold as his unchanging face.

Monte went for something in his coat, but that was stopped with a strike shattering his elbow, then his other elbow. He cried out in agony for mercy, the crazed singing of Joey the guard getting louder as the poor soul tried to drown everything out.

"I will not let you twist them into a crusade for rot. I will not let you bloody their hands, their souls, their dying wishes so that magecraft can continue decaying in the hands of the short-sighted."

Mont spat at his assailant, with eyes as full of defiance as they were tears, "Curse you to hell! Curse you straight to hell with that bastard Melloi! His fate is sealed and so is yours now!"

Danny raised his shillelagh high over his head. Gregori Mont would die that night for his plot to wield things he shouldn't have for reasons they should not be used for. It would not be quick though. He would pay for leading twenty heirs of twenty families to his blood ritual, to their end. For corrupting them into a poison on the magical community with his atrophy championing views.

When it was done, the man's cold gaze turned to Joey, "Is that not a bit cliché? Certainly my name is Danny, but singing 'Oh Danny Boy' as I kill people in Ireland? My sensibilities are insulted."

The guard stopped.

Danny turned and walked to the stage. He looked at the wards and raised a hand at them, breathing an incantation to dispel them through their supply of mana. It was easy compared to direct dispelling, as modern wars did not protect against that manner of casting. When that was done he simply smashed the glass and reached in, feeling the mana suffusing the relic, the remnants of countless souls that had passed the object in its lifetime. He could feel tiny slivers of memory and emotion still imprinted there. A particularly pleasant one was a grandfather passing the relic to a young girl just getting truly skilled in magecraft. One who adored old stories of heroes.

From that memory he confirmed. It was the shard of a table.

Danny whispered, "Grandfather was this really part of the Round Table. Yes, Pet, that very legendary thing. I wouldn't doubt this crossed paths with Arthur or even Merlin!"

Danny smiled. Though it was not his smile he could enjoy the expression of the young girl, Petunia Nightcress, even if she had died of cancer that had eaten her magic circuits right as rumors of the Third Holy Grail War had started. Her deathbed regret years after was that she had missed such a chance to met a Knight of the Round Table, to perhaps be charmed by Gawain or Galahad, to learn from Merlin...

He slipped back through the slivers, a bit shocked at how clear they were in spite of their age. He could find some from almost all the way back.

"Oi! Don't spill your drink on my spot! Why are you even in here with that?"

Danny was jarred at the simple shard of a pointless event. Stronger than any other thing from that time, some Knight of the Round had a drink spilled on their place at the table and was so intensely bothered by that simple thing. The sheer respect the Knight had for that spot was monstrous.

Dapper Danny clasped the object in his hand, holding onto that sensation, sifting through the mess of imprints to find every trace of that knight. "Hello there."

Something stirred in him, something familiar but also something he couldn't' pin down. It was like a clawing obsession trying to bore out of his torso. He turned and walked out of that place without another word to Joey. That place was not deserving of the relic and he would not allow it to taint it further.

In the empty lobby of the opera house, Danny felt a throbbing tension. Like that of someone walking close beside him. Like a faint shard of memory escaping from the relic and trying to take form. He peering into the imprints on the object. A fleeting hope... the knight he couldn't pin down briefly walking alongside his king as they just happened to enter the room at the same time... and how much the simple act of being at his side meant to the knight even though it was just passing each other going the same direction. It was as happy a feeling as it was lonely.

For some reason, Danny wanted to seize the knight, to talk to that knight... to place a hand on that knight's shoulder and... befriend him? That hand he wished to use started to hurt. As if something that wasn't supposed to be was fighting its way into existence.

He lifted his hand and looked at the place it burned... and there on the back of his hand were three red lines. Nothing fancy or ornate, more like three tally marks than what they had to be. When he started to lower his hand it came to rest on something he very briefly couldn't see, something metal. Something that came into view almost before he could finish processing the sensation. His hand was on a shoulder, _the_ shoulder.

The knight was not as tall as one would imagine, clad in mostly white armor with intricate red accents. The face and head of the knight were totally concealed by a horned helmet that allowed no clue as to the knight's identity.

The knight turned, looking at the hand before regarding its owner, "Hey. What's the big idea getting blood on my armor?"

Next Chapter: Phantom Servant

Author's Note: Welcome to a new Fate fic! If you follow my other one, don't worry. This one isn't going to delay that one any longer than it was going to be anyway and even though this fic has nothing to do with that one, all the follow-ups I mentioned are still happening. I just had ideas I wanted to get onto the page. The next chapter of this may come out fore the next chapter of that one, but maybe not. Whatever I feel like. Anyway, onto something about this fic. If you would like to see a particular servant get summoned in this Grail War go ahead and toss me a suggestion in your review. I might put them in if I feel I can integrate them in an interesting way. A caster is coming in next chapter, but (mild spoiler) that doesn't mean that slot is taken. Even if you have no requests, I'm curious what you think of "Dapper Danny". Even though he's still a bit of a mystery at this point, first impressions count for a lot. Anyway see ya next time.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two: Phantom Servant

At the sight in front of him, Danny took two steps back and regarded the small knight in front of him for a moment. It was hard to get a read on him, and Danny could feel something getting in the way of his magical senses. The sheer fact that such a thing was possible given how his magic worked was enough to prove that the knight was indeed a servant. Danny was also pretty confident he was smart enough to deduce who this knight was based on the fact he had some sort of identity concealing Noble Phantasm, surely that kind of thing was a dead giveaway. However, somehow he couldn't place which one it pointed to. Such was the power of that effect.

"I apologize." he looked at himself.

Danny had been too distracted by the relic to pay any mind to the state of his appearance and and walked into what hours earlier would have been a public place.

The knight grumbled a little, "I don't have anything on me to wipe it off. Oh well, if you don't have anything either I don't supposed it matters that much. Not like I'm going to be under inspection or anything."

"Again, apologies." Danny pulled out handkerchief and handed it over, "I wasn't expecting to summon a servant."

"Huh?" the knight took the cloth, wiping the blood off casually, "You summoned me by accident? Is that even a thing that can happen?"

"Apparently." the man looked inwardly for a moment and then tuned those same senses to the relic.

The fragments of memory he had been sifting through in the knight's era were gone, and Danny's magical crest had taken a hit. Thankfully, that probably meant he hadn't accidentally used the souls of the dead below as the hosts of that gathering hd meant to.

"Where even are we? Isn't the thing supposed to be in Japan?"

"We're in Ireland. Probably one of the furthest places on Earth from the Grail. Apparently the theories about it being to possible to summon a servant without the Grail using a strong enough relic and enough tribute are true."

"Wow. I was summoned by accident with no Grail then? I know next to nothing about magecraft; but even I know that's pretty insane." looking at the cloth, he passed it back, "Sorry about your handkerchief, but I don't suppose you'd have offered it if you cared about it."

The knight was only slightly startled when he saw that in the time he'd taken a look at the cloth his summoner had removed the blood from himself. The method was revealed when Danny took the cloth, sent some mana into it, and several runes appeared on it, and the blood was dealt with. It seemed all of the man's clothing were very minor mystic codes made to self-clean. The knight had been around plenty of magecraft, so such a minor thing was nothing impressive. Though he did deduce that the guy must get dirty a lot if he went to the trouble of getting clothes with that magic built into them. The knight pushed that aside for the moment and briefly noted the kind of place he was in. He then carefully rested the tip of his sword on the floor before placing his hands on the pommel, taking a formal stance.

The knight's shoulder armor shifted slightly as the horned helmet opened up, allowing the helmet to tun into several segments that slid down and became shoulder spikes. As this happened, wild blonde hair barely controlled by a ponytail was revealed, as was the equally wild, beautiful face of the knight. Who was a girl. One with a prideful, very slightly fanged smirk on her face.

"I am Mordred, Knight of the Round Table and proud second hound of King Arthur Pendragon."

Though it didn't show on her face, Mordred was slightly offended when Danny's expression did not change.

"Are you not surprised?"

The magus waved the idea aside, "Sorry. I am, it is just I'm not able to express emotion very well. I'm actually more than a little surprised that the Mordred of legend is a girl."

Mordred clenched her sword but didn't raise it, "I would prefer if you didn't refer to me as that."

"Why not? Is it the difference in gender bias between our eras?"

"My gender has been nothing but a pain my entire life, and yeah it's a bit of that."

Danny stroked his chin, "Fair enough..., but my nature compels me to want you to feel positive about your gender."

Mordred almost growled, "For Christ's sake I'm a knight I don't need one."

"And I won't play at being one. How about I agree that I won't treat you like a woman, but neither will I treat you as a man? I will just treat you as you with the only gender bias being the ones decency demands. I won't open doors for you, but I won't share a locker room with you either."

"Agreed."

"I reserve the right to buy you random, platonic presents though."

"Eh? I guess if you want to you can. If it's girly stuff though I'll smack you. I'm not interested in that kinda thing."

"Noted."

"Either way we're off topic. Even if you summoned me by accident, you are my summoner. Can I assume you seek the Grail as well?"

"Not especially."

"HUH?"

"If you are after the Grail I'm sorry to disappoint you, but there's no Grail War on as far as I know."

"That's... that's insane. I mean... you did summon me without a grail; but servants are meant to fight in a contest for the Grail! What point is there for me to even be here? The number one rule of servants is to not interfere in this era!"

"Well, I just got done stopping a cabal of magi from using a blood rite to summon a Knight of the Round to use in a war against the Mages' Association, and there are more sects of them. Is fighting to stop heroes of legend from being used for evil a good enough cause?"

"That blood on you was from people that were intending to use me to wage a war I'm not supposed to fight in? For some power play?"

"You or another Knight of the Round. They don't even have a good reason. I don't know about other sects for sure, but this one they are aligned with was just against the progressive movement in the Association. To put it simply, they were going to war for the sake of obsolete traditions that have been destroying magic for generations."

"What was their catalyst? I want to know how big a mistake they made."

"A chunk of the Round Table, apparently the place you sat at it."

"Mother fuckers. A piece of the Round Table could have gotten any of us. Even King Arthur!" Mordred slammed the point of her sword into the floor in frustration, "If you're being honest, you have my sword. The rest of them will have it too! Straight up their asses! Pieces of shit, putting that kind of shame on me is one thing; but trying to twist the Knights of the Round to fight for garbage like that!"

"Even without the Grail itself up for grabs? I don't know if they mean to force a full on Grail War or not, but the Grail itself shouldn't be charged up enough to grant wishes or host one. We can't expect a reward or any intervention from it, if it can even do that kind of thing."

"Kicking their asses is plenty reward. If they do figure out how to make the Grail into a winner's purse that'll just be a nice bonus. I'll do what the others couldn't and bring a Grail back to Arthur."

Though he face didn't reveal it, Danny was perplexed. Why was the traitor knight, the one that betrayed and killed King Arthur, talking about bringing the spoils of a Grail War back to her King? Come to think of it, she'd introduced herself as a loyal Knight of the Round Table would have. That and the memory fragment in the relic had been of Mordred admiring King Arthur with almost pious devotion. This summoning didn't make any sense. Mordred should not have bee recorded in the Throne of Heroes until her death after betraying Arthur. Yet he'd summoned a Mordred still loyal to her king? Then again, a Grail hadn't been involved...

Mordred suddenly whipped around, looking behind her at a balcony. There was only a flash of black cloth through a doorway to be seen, and the knight was immediately taken off her feet and carried over ten feet by a tackle from her master before she could pursue. A moment later, she heard a crash where they had been standing and looked back. An chandelier had fallen right where they had been standing. She wouldn't have been hurt at all by such a thing, but would have been open to a follow-up attack at least. She didn't know if Danny would have fared as well. The man had dragged the heavily armored knight out of the way and well across the room though, so he was clearly capable of some feats of strength.

She stood, and her master was up before she could help him up, "Thanks, Master."

"Just call me, Danny."

"We have to move. I sensed a servant right before that happened and I can barely still sense it. It's getting away."

"Careful."

"It had to rely on such pitiful trickery to attack, it's probably weak." Mordred started for the stairs.

"The thing is... this room didn't have a chandelier in it until now."

Mordred stopped partway up, "Huh?"

Earlier in the day at the cusp of evening, a beautiful woman of no older than twenty-five sat alone with her head in her hands in the dressing room of the opera house. Another casting gone awry, with her not getting a part in the upcoming performance. It wasn't a large ego that told her that she deserved better. It was simple fact. Danielle Crown was a fantastic singer by all accounts, with every review of her performances from other places being overwhelming positive. She'd never been in anything that failed to earn the equivalent of at least nine out of ten. Such was her skill that some reviews had gone so far as to claim she alone brought the score up six points.

So why hadn't she gotten a part since she relocated? It wasn't a mystery. Danielle had figured out why. The flowers sitting in the trash bin next to her and the note on the table soaked in her tears had been the giveaway. 'Thank you for last night' in the same handwriting as one of her long time secret admirers. There was no mistaken it as the same, because that secret admirer was closer to a more than just borderline stalker. The last night be thanked for? A huge mistake she'd made in drinking with her closet friend Marisa's fiancee. Who also happened to be the director's brother.

The stalker's notes about keeping her all to himself had taken on a whole new meaning that morning as she read that thank you. If the guy were slightly less possessive, Danielle would worry that he would use his position in a more dire way going forward, letting her get parts and threatening to reveal they had slept together if she didn't keep doing so. The stigma of 'sleeping with the director's brother for parts' would hurt her more than any mark on his reputation would hurt him. Even if she hadn't slept with him in the time missing out of her memory all he had to do was make the claim. Andel Marlow was untouchable.

"Why does this keep happening?"

This was the third time someone she'd slightly fancied had turned out to be a psychopath and the second to put her career in danger. Andel had been nothing but a gentleman, and by the measure of most was a decent man for a magus. He didn't even look down on her for being from a dead lineage of magi and had claimed to be holding off his arranged marriage to Marisa out of respect for the natural desire to marry for love. He was a good man... or so she'd thought before she'd gotten far too drunk that night. Maybe she just had terrible taste in men.

Danielle wiped her tears away and took a deep breath. Maybe like the other times-

"Dani are you in here?" a familiar voice at the door pulled Dani's attention to it as Marisa entered the room, "Oh, sweetie. You didn't get a part again? This doesn't make any sense! You're miles better than I am!"

"I-It happens."

Marisa walked over and embraced her friend, mistaking the reason for her tears. Dani was in pieces inside for another reason, as she knew she had to tell her friend what had happened. Not that Marisa was in love with the guy. Even though he'd claimed to have paused the proceedings to give her the chance to and apparently been just going through the motions with his overtures towards her, they hadn't really worked. Marisa had bragged about how much work he'd been putting in, but occasionaly spilled that she still didn't feel anything.

It had always made Dani feel bad about being happy about that. The truth of the matter was that while Dani had crushed a bit on Andel at first, it was just a passing thing. Long gone over the year and a half he'd been in their lives. The truth was... Dani had real feelings for Marisa since they'd met around eight years ago. Sadly, she'd never given any hints of reciprocated.

"Mari... I'm not crying about the part."

"Oh?" Marisa pulled away from the hug, "Is it the stalker again?"

The woman stood up and spotted the flowers in the usual trash can.

"The bastard. What creepy nonsense did he put in the note this time?"

"Mari... did Andel even tell you about the meet-up at the bar after the meeting?"

"The what? What are you talking about Andel?" Marisa was not a fool, and went for the note on the table before Dani could stop her, "This... is Andel's handwriting."

"And the stalker's."

"'Last night'?"

"I don't know... he said he invited you to the bar and you were running late. So we just started drinking without you."

"You slept... with my fiancee?"

"I don't know! I swear I didn't have enough to not remember..., but I dunno what happened after about hour in."

Marisa knelt in front of her friend... trusting her completely, "You think that he drugged you? I mean, if he's nutty enough to stalk you while getting ready to marry me who knows what lengths he'd go to."

"I don't know."

Dani fought back her tears, emboldened by her friend taking her side. In hindsight, she would later wonder why she was surprised. Even when things went horribly wrong in her life everything just seemed to work itself out, always into her favor. The previous two times she'd been harassed in a similar way the guy always met a horrible end. The last was killed by a billboard randomly falling on him for crying out loud.

Marisa grabbed her hands, "Listen. We can figure this out. That bastard's headed to some meeting in the basement with his magus club, but after he leaves that bounded field we can let him have it. I'm calling off the wedding and telling my family what he did. This won't stand."

"Thank god."

"Hell, my father might have him killed. You know how he is. If not, **I'll** have him killed. Nobody does that to my Dani."

Dani hugged her, "I'm so glad you believe me. I would never do anything to hurt you. Not on purpose."

"I know." Marisa hugged her back, "After this... I think I'm done trying to live up to what my father expects of me."

"What do you mean?"

Marisa pulled out of the embrace, "I mean... I've been living a lie."

Something in Dani tensed... something in her very being knew something was awry. There was something... not quite right in Marisa's eyes. Again... again everything was working out for her. Everything was twisting, even if it lead her through a horrible path it always ended up this way. With Dani getting everything she wanted.

Marisa fidgeted, but didn't blush as one normally would when confessing, "Dani, I'm in love with you."

"Marisa... you-"

"I know it's weird for two girls to love each other, but isn't it becoming more and more acceptable anyway? It's not that weird anymore. If you could maybe just... try it out?"

"Mari... I...," Dani was deeply torn, "I love you too. There's no trying it out. I've loved you for years."

Marisa practically tackled her, "Oh my god! I should have just said something years ago then! I could have saved you all this pain."

Marisa being so close made something stir inside Dani. Even though she'd been through a nightmare with Andel, part of the woman knew she could drown it away with the help of the woman she loved.

Almost on cue, Marisa's hug became more caressing, "You know... weren't you a virgin? We can figure out if he's just bluffing or not pretty easily. All we need to do is a little inspection. If you know what I mean."

Dani pushed her away gently, "I think that would be going too fast, don't you?"

Hands went up her thighs, Marisa's, "I don't think so."

As she fully realized what was happening, again, Dani wanted to stop. She knew something was wrong... that something had been wrong with her for years... that going through with this was no better than what Andel had pulled. She didn't need any inspection. Now that she knew her strange curse was in effect again Dani also knew she was still a virgin. Not because she remembered, but because that was how she wanted it and everything always went how she wanted it in the end. If she just rode this out she'd probably own the opera house by the morning or be the permanent star of the place. What was wrong with her? Why did these things keep happening like this?

She didn't stop though, and just let Marisa do what she wanted her to do with her hands.

"Oh, there we go..." Marisa beamed, "He didn't get his way! Now... now I can have mine."

It was then that Dani found her resolve, shoving her friend to the ground, "Stop!"

Unbeknownst to both of them, through sheer coincidence, Marisa hit the ground the same moment Andel Marlow's decapitated body did. In the next few moments, Dapper Danny would have completely massacred the entire summoning ritual in the basement, ruining it before it could begin.

"Dani?"

"I'm... I'm dealing with a sexual assault here you know?" Dani grasped at the totally logical way to defuse the screwy situation, "He nearly raped me for crying out loud. He was probably going to trick me into thinking we did sleep together so he could. I don't even remember how I escaped that situation last night!"

"Oh, Dani... I'm so sorry I don't know what came over me... I just wanted to make you forget that... I thought I could make you forget that."

"There's nothing I want more than to forget all of this!"

Something moving in the mirror caught Dani's attention... and it was then that she saw her reflection... no it wasn't her. It looked like her, but Danielle Crown herself wasn't wearing an elaborate dress or a long out of fashion hair-style. The woman in the mirror was like a version of her from the 1800s. And had an intricate rune resembling a rose split into three parts on the back of her hand.

Marisa didn't seem to notice, "You know what? To hell with his meeting! I'm going down there right now and telling him off in front of his little club!"

Dani was too entranced by the figure in the mirror to stop her and simply moved the hand that was marked in the reflection, which in tuner moved the reflection as if it really were her. When she looked at the actual hand, so did the reflection. However, it was only Dani that gasped at the sight onf the mark actually being on her hand.

The reflection raised her head as Marisa closed the door behind her and it spoke in Dani's voice. Literally her voice, as the words came out of her own mouth.

"Caster class servant, Catherine Daae. Are you my master?"

Next Chapter: A Night at the Opera

Author's Note: And there we have it. Sorry about the long delay. I fell and hurt my wrist the very day after I posted the prior chapter and after that got really busy at work. Ugh. Anyway, this chapter we've seen Mordred is actually summoned from before the incident that made her betray her king, so for anyone playing Fate Grand Order this is sort of like a "Mordred Lily" despite being pretty much the same age. Mordred before she became the villain of the legend. That has some implications for the future. Also, we see the appearance of a woman who practically has the same name as Danny and seems to have some sort of monkey's paw like curse on her? And she's unwittingly summoned the female protagonist of the Phantom of the Opera shortly before a Phantom-like servant attacks Danny and Mordred. What will happen in this clash of accidental masters with effectively identical names? Why do they have the same name? If Danielle summoned Catherine, who summoned the Phantom of the Opera who attacked our heroes? All this and more are to come!


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three: A Night at the Opera

Earlier than that, at the same moment that both Mordred and the Caster known as Catherine appeared in the world in unbeknownst unison, a man of outstanding normalcy in appearance was abruptly standing as slightly ajar of the summoning circle in the basement as his personality was slightly ajar of the common man. The only distinct things of the man's somewhat handsome features were a notably lower chin and jaw than one normally sees as well as a strikingly shaped nose that gave him an inquisitive look to his cutting but dispassionate gaze.

The man brushed off his three-piece suit, still in fashion today thanks to the simple design being the foundation of modern business wear. He observed his surroundings with much aversion and concern, but outwardly the only reaction the crowd of battered corpses and gravely injured elicited was a seemingly uncaring two word acknowledgment aimed at no one. It was certainly not aimed at the apparently unharmed man clutching his hand to his chest to the side of the summoning platform. After all, he had not seen that man when he'd so mutely exclaimed. That did not stop him from approaching and addressing him in due course however.

"You there, are you injured? What manner of nonsense has engulfed this place?"

The cowering man looked up with a jolt and eyes as full of madness as they were both of relief and shock. He fumbled into his breast pocket and produced a paperback book, looking at the back and then back to the fairly dressed man before him. As he did so, the summoned figure managed to read the cover, 'The Collected Works of H.P. Lovecraft, as restored by S.T. Joshi'.

The crazed man was jubilant, "I did it! I didn't think I had made it in range... did I even do the incantation? I can't... why is this a valid catalyst? Oh god... why was I even trying to get back involved in this? He'll kill me this time! He'll stop letting me go!"

"Talk sense, boy. Where am I? How have I been summoned as a servant? I know of the process and the qualifications. Even barring how recent my era was, I do not qualify as a Heroic Spirit. What sorcery is this?"

"Well, blood magic technically."

Lovecraft snatched the book from the man's hands and struck him across the face with it, "How dare you. Such... such depravity!"

The writer dismissed all care for the cowering man and examined the collection of his work, "Why must I be undignified in such a way just to find myself with the author's curse. I must find out where I am located and this 'Joshi' in due time. His selection is questionable, his editing seemingly suitable in the face of a casual browse."

"Um, we're in the basement of an Opera House in Wexton, Ireland."

Lovecraft flinched at the word Ireland, "Ah, his ancestral homeland then. That is just across the channel from London if I recall correctly."

"Yes."

"Wonderful. I never did get the chance to visit. I would rather be summoned in Providence by a man not want to engage in the filth of this wanton savagery. However, this is far better than being summoned to the backwater country the Grail is kept within."

The cowering man was still shaking, "I suppose... we will have to go there eventually if we fall back in with-"

"I did not ask for your input any more than I asked for a master fool enough to do these things, nor to be summoned so close to other servants."

"Other servants?"

"Yes. This does not seem a war for the Grail so far from it, yet I sense many servants. Two or three more in the building, maybe even four, and another within the city limits."

"There... there weren't supposed to be any reinforcements here."

"So you summoned me among enemy servants? Fool!" Lovecraft pulled a book from his pocket, a different tome, and struck the man with it, "Read this and tell me what dangers you have summoned me into."

The once guard quietly grew more afraid. For the writer had forced an intimidatingly large tome made of all sorts of leathers and many clasps into his hands. However he relaxed when a pensive inspection revealed the name was not the suspected 'Necronomicon', but instead something he'd never heard of called 'Al Azif'.

"What is this?

"Not that you need to know, but it is a tome that identifies adversaries. Though it twas originally a guide to the Old Ones, the summoning has made it more broadly useful."

"Can you tell their True Names with it?"

"No. Now read it."

"Um, what page?"

Lovecraft sighed, "Have you not noticed the trope of the right page always being in the middle? I am a writer servant, bound to such feeble things."

"Oh." the man turned the book as close to the middle as he could. Sure enough it was right there on the page he looked at, "Saber and Caster are in the building. Strange..."

"What?"

"There are two casters. I can see that you are one of them, but the other I can't tell. It's even more bizarre because it says that one is both the servant and master."

"That aside, are there any other servants?"

He studied closer, "Well, another one is showing up as part of the caster. I... can't find Saber's master on the page though. It's bizarre, it says she's working with something but doesn't identify it. Doesn't even describe it as human or as both like the other Caster."

"Fascinating. Something the tome can't identify? Something would have to outrank it... that or..." Lovecraft pondered the rest silently before pushing that aside, "What of the servant in the city?"

"Rider class. It's apparently many times stronger than all three other servants."

"Hm. A lot of uncertainty surrounds us. This calls for a retreat and a session of regrouping. I assume you villainous lot have a secret escape route of some variety?"

"Y-yes. Right over on the far wall. You just pull the candlestick."

Lovecraft raised an eyebrow, "Truly?"

"I thought it was stupid too."

The writer snatched his book away, closing it in the same motion, "Who wrote this farce? Such feeble plot!"

"Let's just get out of here! I don't want any part of this anymore!" the man hurried to the wall, "Maybe if I give you to the boss she'll just let me walk away and you can have a better master than me."

"It would be nice."

Lovecraft followed and watched as the cowardly man reached up with his right hand to pull down the switch. His completely blank right hand. This mage was not a master, much less _his_ master. It mattered not in the long run. Lovecraft has already surmised as much and dealt with the situation. The Al Azif, or rather the tome that would become known as the Necronomicon, had manifest as a variation of its purpose in his stories. A guide to the forces that threatened mankind. More specifically, in this form it would identify the enemies of the reader. The cowardly man had read it, and found Lovecraft within it. His master would not have. Lovecraft's master also would not be a victim of the tome's drawback if they had any command seals left. Any other reader, including Lovecraft, would meet a gruesome end.

For now, Lovecraft would entertain the delusions of the man leading him out of the building. After all, the nature of whatever thing might outrank the most infamous magical tome in history was a far more pressing issue.

At about this time, but in the lobby, Mordred raised an eyebrow, "There wasn't a chandelier here before? What kind of useless Noble Phantasm is that?"

Danny pointed to the ceiling, and sure enough Mordred could not see any sort of mounting for the chandelier to hang from. The question still stood though. Such an attack was not on the scale of a Noble Phantasm. At least not one that could damage a servant. Again, it would have left Mordred open to attack if it had landed, so maybe it was simply part of a more powerful attack and Danny had helped more than she had given credit.

The man explained his own theory on the matter, which shared a part with Mordred's, "This might be part of a Noble Phantasm, but likely only an ability scale one. I don't think this is the trump card. This seems like a use of Territory Creation."

"Caster or not it's getting away." Mordred started to turn.

"If it's a caster you could be running into a trap."

Mordred whipped around, "I'm a Saber, magic resistance."

"I know, I can see it and that it's Ranked B. That's not high enough to act immune. Three line incantations bypass it. That's barely enough to pose an issue to modern magecraft."

"I'm not some featherweight!"

"I'm saying we have another, better option."

Danny did not change expression or tone, but Mordred could tell he was a little annoyed. She'd spent a large chunk of her life obsessively observing a stone-faced person after all. Even if she couldn't fully understand Arthur, she could pick up on Danny's invisible ticks.

"Let's hear it then."

The man briefly closed his eyes as he took a deep breath. Mordred caught the minor lip movements during both parts of the breath, and was pretty sure she almost heard him say something. It was incredibly short, but she knew an incantation when she saw one, and knew that most magi spoke aloud to do them. Merlin didn't for the most part, but he was Merlin.

"That's alarming." Danny said matter of factually, "There's two of them. Casters don't have multiple territories as far as I know."

"Right. I'm pretty sure they just have one workshop like a magus."

"Two casters then. I guess the rules for this conflict will be unpredictable."

Mordred stomped over, "You're sure? You didn't spend much time analyzing."

"Bounded fields and their derivatives are child's play to my style of magecraft. If we're outnumbered by casters you probably have the best master you could for the situation. This is a little out of the range of calibers I'm used to dealing with, but as long as we stay sharp it shouldn't be an issue."

Danny pulled out a smartphone.

"The two overlap; but one is smaller but stronger. It's keeping me from telling the exact range of the weaker, larger one. One of them is also blocking communication."

"Have backup nearby?"

"No, there's someone that one of the bad guys revealed is a target for assassination. Priority one is warning them over anything else."

"So let's step out and-"

A single motion pointed behind her was joined with, "Well the front door was over there when I came in."

Mordred glanced back. There was no door. When she turned back around...

"The walls changed colors!"

"We need to act now. The smaller territory is changing the area, but this isn't a reality marble yet."

Mordred turned to the nearest wall.

"Not an option, Mordred." Danny was headed up the stairs, "We have to find a section that hasn't changed yet."

"I can bust through!"

"Try then." he didn't stop.

Mordred growled and swung with all her might at the wall... nothing. Looking at her sword she pondered trying her Noble Phantasm. It was a plain sword, nothing of the caliber used by the more prestigious knights of the court and certainly not anywhere in the league of any of Arthur's weapons. It was just a random sword. Just like hundreds she'd broken trying to use that attack through it. If the past were any indication Mordred would be lucky to have three shots with it before she lost her weapon.

"Dammit!" she whipped around and, seeing that Danny was already down the hall, leaped to the landing of the stairs and sprinted after him.

He didn't wait to go right back to barking instruction and didn't break the stride of his brisk jog, "The source of this one is strangely at the center of this effect, which is going inward rather than out from the source."

"A net?"

"With one entire side open. The owner's in the center of this warping effect, but not in the dead center of the building. If it's a net, it's cast poorly."

"So what do you want to do?"

"Lots of variables, but priority one is to get a message out of the building." he passed her his phone, "If all else fails, bust out then press button on the side to turn it on, then the green box on the front to send the message."

"I can take that feeble Caster."

"Just in case. Also that thing you saw was just a familiar."

"Huh?"  
"Confused me too when I analyzed the area. I thought there were three servants at a glance, but that's just a familiar. Probably for the Caster in control of the theater."

"So it's two and a half on one?"

"Five on two. Don't count out the masters here."

"How much do you even the odds in my favor then?"

"I-"

Suddenly the floor beneath them gave way with no warning. It was easy to notice right away that the floor beneath theirs was also collapsed, but they passed through that before Danny noticed there was yet another floor down. One that shouldn't be there. The warping had changed their elevation in the building. It was a reality marble for sure, but Danny could still sense it had not fully ensnared them yet. Why it was being so slow was beyond his ability to know at the moment.

He was too busy drawing mana into his tailored suit. He could feel his legs heating up as the mystic code did its thing and he slowed, grabbing Mordred by one hand as he halted mid-air. He promptly tossed her up to the floor above.

"Pull me up immed-"

On that note he was tackled by something to fast to catch more than a fleeting glimpse of the same cloth as before. It carried the man out of Mordred too loose grasp and into the darkness.

"MASTER!"

"Go up! Message!" the man yelled back, still emotionless in his current situation.

Mordred got to her feet and positioned to jump, "Fuck you! I'm saving you!"

In that moment, Mordred hesitated, thinking back to every lesson, every complaint she'd ever had hammered into her. She thought back to a time she'd let an innocent farmer die to help Sir Marrok during a bandit raid. He'd yelled at her. He'd said she needed to trust him.

"That was just the familiar of the Caster."

The knight looked around at the walls changing. It was obvious if she didn't bolt and either kill the caster of get out of the building she'd be trapped and her master's mission might fail. As Marrok would have said, Mordred had a duty.

"Dammit!" she leaped the other way and bolted down the hall, quickly outrunning the effect once again, "I'll fuckin' kill this entire building if it keeps gettin' in my fucking way!"

Meanwhile, Danny landed after a four story fall from the second floor of the three story building in the unfamiliar bottom floor lobby. Only his durable jacket keep the crystals of the hanging chandelier mounted securely on the ceiling from cutting him as he and the figure crashed past it. Though the fall wouldn't have harmed him, a woman he immediately sensed was just a part of the reality marble broke his fall.

Someone in the artificial crowd filling the lobby gasped dramatically in French, "Oh no! My word! What as happened here! The bell of the hall has suffered quite the fall! Can the show go on from here?"

Danny stood up and looked around, "Wait, why did that rhyme and sound like the lead up to a-"

The crowd, he observed, looked as if they had been having a grand gala celebrating the diva that was now lying injured and unconscious on the ground. They didn't seem to notice him at all, nor did they notice the well-dressed man in a cloak dramatically swishing away on a balcony, giving only the slimmest of chances for Danny to notice a white porcelain mask covered a portion of its face. The margin even slimmer from the fact that the crowd had indeed transitioned into a musical number around him.

"Goddammit. The Phantom of the Opera didn't even exist! It wasn't even originally a musical!"

He looked over, spotting the door leading out of the opera house, and even knowing it wouldn't work Danny went for it, brute forcing through a couple doing an elaborate portion of the dance involving a lift. They weren't real, so it didn't matter that they went careening across the floor or that the lady broke an ankle.

The crowd still didn't notice he was breaking up the scene. Someone else simply gasped, "Oh no! Again! Fate has seemed to end them! The understudy seemingly has fallen to the Phantom! The Phantom is afoot! The Phantom is afoot!"

Danny stopped and belted the woman that had sang that across the face, his own face not conveying apparent annoyance, "That doesn't even rhyme! Not even keeping time! This number so sophomore!"

Realization hit, and he really meant to quit...

"I've got to make it to the doooooor!"

Noble Danny burst though the ornate wood and glass. What he saw beyond would knock a lesser on their ass. The assemblage you see, escape not meant to be!

They welcomed to their chorus, a man of looks and skill so glorious, "Raul! My friend! The show has seen its end!"

"These rhymes they do offend! This is not the Weber version, please note down my aversion!"

He brushed aside the grasping hands, and acknowledged not the playing bands. The phantom was afoot!

"The Phantom is afoot!"

Next Chapter: Rider and Caster

A/N: Sorry for the long delay. Life happens sometimes. I haven't the time to give this a good proofreading, and my ability to write a musical number conveying Danny getting trapped in the effect of a Noble Phantasm in the role of Raul (one of the leads of the Phantom of the Opera story) is more than just perhaps lackluster. Forgive me. Next time, we boop over to showcase one of the Riders of the story and we'll see a showdown between Danny and the Phantom (god, I didn't even catch that unintended "Danny Phantom" thing until just now) and Caster Catherine. Don't worry, most of the chapter won't be a really bad musical number.


End file.
